Value of circumcision
Day 552, Saturday, Feb. 14
Romans 3:1-8
You could almost take today’s reading as a contradiction of what we read yesterday. Now Paul is saying that there is much value in being a Jew and in being circumcised. If you read this as Paul being wishy-washy, you would not be alone—other readers have come to the same conclusion.
In fact, Paul does consider it a privilege to be a Jew, and believes his people are a vital part of God’s plan. “First of all, the Jews have been entrusted with the very words of God.”
Paul tries to be part of the different groups of people he ministers to. As we remember from Acts, he is uniquely qualified to do this, as he is both a faithful Jew and a Roman citizen and moves easily between different segments of society. In 1 Corinthians 9 we will even hear him say, “I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some.”
There are those in our day who consider Paul to be rigid and legalistic, but in his day he was more frequently accused of being too lenient in his teaching. In verse 8 he says that he has been accused of preaching, “Let us do evil that good may result.” This isn’t the only time we’ll see this accusation directed at him.
Paul works very hard to build a bridge between the Jews who follow Jesus while keeping their Jewish traditions, and the gentiles who follow Jesus and don’t see the value in those same traditions. He is not always completely successful.

-Rev. Mark Fleming

Saturday meditation

Psalms 78:40-55
How often they rebelled against him in the wilderness and grieved him in the wasteland! Again and again they put God to the test; they vexed the Holy One of Israel. They did not remember his power—the day he redeemed them from the oppressor, the day he displayed his signs in Egypt, his wonders in the region of Zoan. He turned their river into blood; they could not drink from their streams. He sent swarms of flies that devoured them, and frogs that devastated them. He gave their crops to the grasshopper, their produce to the locust. He destroyed their vines with hail and their sycamore-figs with sleet. He gave over their cattle to the hail, their livestock to bolts of lightning. He unleashed against them his hot anger, his wrath, indignation and hostility—a band of destroying angels. He prepared a path for his anger; he did not spare them from death but gave them over to the plague. He struck down all the firstborn of Egypt, the firstfruits of manhood in the tents of Ham. But he brought his people out like a flock; he led them like sheep through the wilderness. He guided them safely, so they were unafraid; but the sea engulfed their enemies. And so he brought them to the border of his holy land, to the hill country his right hand had taken. He drove out nations before them and allotted their lands to them as an inheritance; he settled the tribes of Israel in their homes.

Prayer focus
You have given us a ministry of reconciliation. May we be bridge-builders and peacemakers.